Susan Morrison: Fifty years of living with hayfever is over – I’m a grown up at last

Naturally, my mother marched me to the doctor’s surgery. This was a grim, grey, wee building in the middle of some waste land.

My eyes were swollen shut and I had started to wheeze as well as sneeze Picture: Alamy/PA

There was no mad 8am scramble for appointments in those days. You just pitched up and took the next two spaces on the rows of benches in the tiny waiting room, which was essentially a giant petri dish of fabulous infections.

People with weird rashes would helpfully pass the local paper around. Folk would sit practically coughing their lungs up, expelling fresh fuel for the invisible swirling clouds of airborne bacteria.

You waited patiently until the receptionists pulled your grey folder from the shelf behind them. They were local lassies and knew everything about everyone.

This, along with the fact that it was their sacred duty to protect the doctors from those not worthy of their attention meant that the reception for some could be pretty frosty.

You could tell by the way they shouted the names out. Mrs Taylor could never keep the curl off her lip when any of the Menzies family were in.

She told my mum that they “were ‘aw at it.” Mum said she thought Mr Menzies was signed off work because he had a growth on his back. “Aye”, said Mrs Taylor. “It’s his mattress.” Two things, there, children. One, patient confidentiality was still a novel concept and two, the idea of the hidden disability still had to catch on.

Because I was still technically a child, the NHS didn’t have a folder for me or even use my own name and since we rarely bothered the surgery, mum’s name was called out warmly and I was marched into the doctor's office to stand beside his desk. Mum got the chair. We both waited until he’d stubbed out his fag. I am not joking.

Scottish children were not permitted to speak directly to doctors until they hit drinking age, so mum usually detailed the symptoms. She didn’t have to this time. My eyes were swollen shut and I had started to wheeze as well as sneeze. The second hand smoke was possibly not helping.

Hayfever, he announced. Usually hits about this age. The word ‘puberty’ was never mentioned. The prevailing view was that the less said about that the better.

Yes, he said, lighting up again, pollen, dust, that sort of thing will trigger it off. Here’s a prescription for some tablets and an eyebath. She’ll probably grow out of it when she becomes an adult.

I didn’t. Every spring since then has been a veritable tsunami of snot and sneezes. I used to try every new thing out on the market and at one point seriously wondered if I should invest in a Victorian-style diving suit. My paper tissue bill rivalled Elton John's flower budget.

Last week, I drove past my greatest enemy. A brilliant yellow field of rapeseed. Too late I realised the car window was open. Tissues at the ready, I waited for the sneezing to start.

Nothing. A few hours later, I was in a freshly mown kirkyard. Again, nothing.

I slowly realised what had happened. Finally, after all these years, I have become an adult.